Red in NYC

Red is going to NYC the same weekend as I.  We will spend some time together running around town. This is good.  I love to show people my New York.  Everybody has his/her own.  New York is a trope, and she shall experience mine.  If we do nothing else, we will go to the Met together.  We will go early and have lunch and drinks and then look some more.  We will walk through Central Park.  We will see Woody and Sun Yi as always.  It will be like old times.

I was looking through my blog today, hung over and able to do little else.  And I was impressed.  Quite.  Nope, I'm not ashamed at all.  It is, all things told, quite a feat.  I have a few people who comment and prop me up, but other than that. . . . Still, it goes on, rain or shine, shit or Shinola.  It goes through patches and spells, but in the end, I think, it is worth the price a reader pays, if they are of a certain type.  Some of you have been here from early on.  I can't tell you.  I think the internet is fabulous if for no other reason than this.

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It is a gray morning and the factory whistles are blowing.  I had brunch with a wealthy friend of mine who comes from family money that was made, originally, by his grandfather but was increased by his pop.  He was telling me about how much he works, how many hours of manual labor on a tree farm he owns.  He draws a paltry salary, he said.  I didn't say anything, just grinned.  Alright, he said, I can afford to.  Still. . . .

We were talking about the election, of course, and about the rich and the poor, again, of course, because that is what the election is about.  He pointed to my house and asked me how I got so rich.  I laughed and said I wasn't rich at all, that I didn't have two months savings in the bank, that when he looked at the house, he saw it all, all the money, all the debt.  Exactly, he said.  So why should he pay for my financial mistakes he wanted to know.  We were talking about socialism and social justice, you see.  But he wanted to make it personal.  I haven't made any mistakes, I said.  But why, continued, if I work hard and save my money and built capital, why should I pay for your mistakes.  I haven't made any mistakes, I said again, my voice dead flat.  I've worked since college, sometimes for hardly a living wage, and I've spent my money on the things of life.  I've not invested and lost.  I've not run a failed company.  I've not gotten caught cheating or corrupting.  I just worked and spent my money.  I didn't spend anyone else's money.  I spent the money I'd made.  

Sometimes I think the wealthy believe they are a separate race.